No Longer New York City’s ‘Boulevard of Death’

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A bicyclist along Queens Boulevard in Queens, which became known as the “Boulevard of Death.’' But since Mayor Bill de Blasio made it a focus of his plan to make city streets safer, not a single pedestrian or bicyclist has been killed on the roadway since 2014.CreditCreditMichelle V. Agins/The New York Times

It was one of New York City’s deadliest streets, a combat zone where one pedestrian after another was mowed down trying to get across.

Cars and trucks hurtling down Queens Boulevard left a rising death toll in their wake, including 18 pedestrians killed just in a single year, in 1997. Overall, since 1990, a total of 186 people have been killed on this one street, of whom 138 were pedestrians.

Before long, the street earned lasting notoriety in tabloid headlines as the “Boulevard of Death.”

But today, the Boulevard of Death is no more. Not a single pedestrian or cyclist has been killed on the seven-mile long thoroughfare that slices through Queens since 2014. “The Boulevard of Death has become the Boulevard of Life,” declared Mayor Bill de Blasio in an interview. “We’ve turned the corner.”

Queens Boulevard has become the poster child for Mr. de Blasio’s ambitious Vision Zero campaign to eliminate traffic deaths citywide through a host of enforcement measures and safety improvements, including redesigning streets and re-timing walk signals to give pedestrians a head start in crosswalks.

His administration has faced criticism from some transportation advocates and community leaders that the campaign has stalled. While the overall number of people killed in traffic crashes declined last year to 231, pedestrian deaths — the largest share of those fatalities — rose to 148, up from 139 in 2015.

This year’s numbers are more promising, with 198 overall traffic deaths as of Nov. 21, or 11 fewer than the same time last year. Of those, 92 involved pedestrians, or 41 fewer than the year before, while 19 involved cyclists, or two more than the year before.

Caroline Samponaro, deputy director of Transportation Alternatives, an advocacy group, said that while the transformation of Queens Boulevard showed that Vision Zero was progressing, there were plenty of other dangerous streets that needed to be tamed.

“Their immediate fix must happen as soon as possible and on a clear public timeline if Vision Zero is to be realized,” she said. “This will mean making the changes that have happened on Queens Boulevard the norm, not the exception.”

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Department of Transportation staff members, from left, Lily Gordon-Koven, Kessia Deleo and Ann Marie Doherty cross Queens Boulevard. Queens Boulevard is as wide as 300 feet in some places, making it a challenge for people to cross safely. As a result, city officials have eliminated some vehicle lanes and lengthened the timing of walk signals.CreditMichelle V. Agins/The New York Times

Queens Boulevard is one of the city’s best-known arteries, even meriting a cameo in the popular HBO series, “Entourage,” when the main character, Vince, stars in a movie of that name. It carries traffic between the Queensboro Bridge, which crosses over the East River to Manhattan, and fast-growing neighborhoods in central Queens. Pieced together from existing streets in the early 1900s, the boulevard once included a trolley line that shuttled riders back and forth to Manhattan during the 1920s and 1930s.

One of its most distinctive features — and one of the most dangerous for pedestrians — is that it is broad enough to carry up to a dozen vehicle lanes. It stretches as wide as 300-feet-across in some places, or one-third more than some Manhattan blocks. In contrast, First Avenue in Manhattan, another bustling corridor, is only 70-feet-wide. Side streets are typically 30-feet-wide.

For pedestrians, that meant crossing Queens Boulevard was a race to the other side before the traffic lights turned green. Teenagers used to challenge one another. Older walkers simply could not move that quickly, often ending up stranded in narrow medians with cars whizzing by.

“It was very dangerous,” said Theresa McGowan, 75, a retired nurse, who has crossed the boulevard for decades and used to worry every time she did. “I know someone who got killed just crossing over because the cars don’t wait. A lot of people got killed.”

By the late 1990s, the double-digit deaths on Queens Boulevard spurred efforts by city transportation officials, advocates and family members of victims to make it safer. During the next decade and a half, the city adjusted the timing of walk signals to give pedestrians a full 60 seconds to cross, compared with 32 to 50 seconds before. Officials broadened curbs to shorten the crossing, and widened medians and built protective barriers around them. More crosswalks were added and fencing installed along the entire boulevard to deter jay walking.

They also removed two of the 12 car lanes to slow traffic, leaving 10 lanes — six lanes for through traffic (three in each direction), two service lanes for public buses and to access local side streets and two parking lanes. Cameras were installed to catch drivers running red lights.

It was not enough. While there was an immediate decline in traffic deaths, 2013 brought another spike, with eight deaths, six of which involved pedestrians.

“We had to take a fresh look,” said Ann Marie Doherty, a senior director at the city’s Department of Transportation. “People were still getting killed so we knew we had to do something dramatic to make it safer.”

Mayor de Blasio, who took office in 2014, ordered the speed limit on Queens Boulevard to be lowered from 30 miles per hour to 25 miles per hour — the city’s new default speed limit — overriding city traffic engineers who had wanted to keep higher speed limits on some major arteries.

Mr. de Blasio called the boulevard the “single worst offender” when it came to deadly streets in the interview. He paraphrased a line from a Frank Sinatra song, saying “if we could fix it there, we could fix it anywhere.”

“Queens Boulevard is the ultimate example of what was wrong in this city for decades,” he said. “I love my city but something was broken that we had a street called the Boulevard of Death and we accepted that.”

Since then, city transportation officials have invested $4 million to redesign the boulevard, including putting in bike lanes and more crosswalks and places for pedestrians to wait in the median while crossing, and redesigned car lanes to reduce conflicts between local and through traffic. They added cameras to catch speeding drivers near two schools.

The average speed midday along the boulevard dropped to 25.6 miles per hour for the eastbound lane in 2016 from 28.7 miles per hour in 2014. The average speed for the westbound lane dropped to 27.3 miles per hour from 31.5 miles per hour during that period.

The other day residents walked briskly in the crosswalks past multiple lanes of traffic. Some said they no longer worried as much about making the crossing though they were still cautious.

“I still think it’s dangerous because you have still have cars going through red lights and people not paying attention when they cross,” said Lorraine Norton, 61, an administrative assistant.

Some residents have complained that the redesign of the boulevard has increased congestion by slowing down traffic and bringing more bicyclists who do not heed pedestrians. They also said that the bike lanes take away parking and make it more difficult for deliveries.

But for Lizi Rahman, the bike lanes fulfill a promise that she made to herself after her 22-year-old-son, Asif, was struck and killed by a truck while riding a bike on the street in 2008. Since then, Ms. Rahman, 59, a preschool teacher, has become one of the staunchest advocates for the bike lanes. “It won’t bring my son back,” she said, but added that now “maybe other people will be safe.”

The biggest changes are still to come to Queens Boulevard. In 2019, the city expects to begin a $255-million project that will add wide, tree-lined medians, benches and a continuous bike and walking path. Ms. Doherty said that she envisioned a “linear park” that could be enjoyed by all users of the boulevard.

“We want it to be a place where people want to come,” she said.

A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A15 of the New York edition with the headline: In Queens, a ‘Boulevard of Death’ Vanquished by de Blasio’s Traffic Plan. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe